Parents say 'no' to pupils' demand for #skinnypants

Pretoria - Skinny pants will not form part of the uniform at the Pretoria West High School.

The Pretoria News had it on good authority that that parents voted against the “demand” by pupils who wanted to be allowed to wear skinny pants to school.

Subsequently, the resolution was forwarded to Education MEC Panyaza Lesufi, who is expected to make an announcement in due course.

The vote by parents at a governing body meeting means pupils will have to carry on with the common grey, school uniform cut that they were opposed to.

There was drama at the school in the past week when pupils disrupted classes, demanding to wear skinny pants.

Officials from the Gauteng Department of Education visited the school following reports of the disruption.

It was confirmed that the protest emanated from two pupils who transgressed the code of conduct regarding uniform.

Following a disciplinary process, they were suspended for seven days. Their seven days lapsed last Thursday, after which they apparently began to coerceothers to force the school to allow them to wear skinny pants.

The pupils distributed a flyer at school which read: “Mass Skinny Pants Day. We are going to wear our skinny pants daily until they allow us to. PS: No teachers involved.”

Pretoria West High School pupils demanded the incorporation of skinny pants into school uniform.

Both boys and girls said they decided to express their unhappiness with the school rule by going on a defiance campaign.They threatened to wear their preferred cut of pants until the school authorities relented, adding the usual school uniform cut is “too big” for them.

Early this week, those who persisted with wearing skinny pants were sent home to change, while classes returned to normal.

Chairperson of the school governing body, Brian Zyster, later told the Pretoria News the matter would be put up for vote at the meeting to be held within seven days.

Zyster added that the school had always had a democratic approach to sorting out their issues and was disappointed by the approach the pupils took this time around.

He said pupils should have followed the correct procedure and protocol.

“They could have gone to the representative council of learners, their class teachers, the principal, deputy principal or even the parents if they felt so strongly about changing the school uniform.”

He said the approach had left much to be desired and was, in fact, bullish.

“There is procedure and protocol to everything. You can’t just have your way when you feel like it. If that were the case, school would be havoc,” he said.

When contacted last night, Zyster would not confirm nor deny that a decision had been reached.